He was begotten in the galley and born under a gun. Every hair was a rope yarn, every finger a fish-hook, every tooth a marline-sp...ike, and his blood right good Stockholm tar.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »

Ratcliffe was a great statesman. The smoothness of his manipulation was marvelous. No other man in politics, indeed no other man w...ho had ever been in politics in this country, could--his admirers said--have brought together so many hostile interests and made so fantastic a combination. Some men went so far as to maintain that he would "rope in the President himself before the old man had time to swap knives with him." The beauty of his work consisted in the skill with which he evaded questions of principle. As he wisely said, the issue now involved was not one of principle but of power.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »

Across Parker Avenue from the fort is the Site of the Old Gallows, where 83 men "stood on nothin', a-lookin' up a rope." The platf...orm had a trap wide enought to "accommodate" 12 men, but half that number was the highest ever reached. On two occasions six miscreants were executed. There were several groups of five, some quartets and trios.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »

You've strung your breastswith a rattling rope of pearls,...tied a jangling beltaround those deadly hipsand clinking jewelled ankletson both your feet.So, stupid,if you run off to your lover like this,banging all these drums,then whydo you shudder with all this fearand look up, down;in every direction?LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »

Whenever there's a big war coming on, you should rope off a big field. And on the big day, you should take all the kings and their... cabinets and their generals, put 'em in the center dressed in their underpants and let them fight it out with clubs. The best country wins.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »

When the first baby laughed for the first time, the laugh broke into a thousand pieces and they all went skipping about, and that ...was the beginning of fairies. And now when every new baby is born its first laugh becomes a fairy. So there ought to be one fairy for every boy or girl.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »

I was not at all shocked with this execution at the time. John died seemingly without much pain. He was effectually hanged, the ro...pe having fixed upon his neck very firmly, and he was allowed to hang near three quarters of an hour; so that any attempt to recover him would have been in vain. I comforted myself in thinking that by giving up the scheme I had avoided much anxiety and uneasiness.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »

How easily and cleverly do I write just now! I am really pleased with myself; words come skipping to me like lambs upon Moffat Hil...l; and I turn my periods smoothly and imperceptibly like a skilful wheelwright turning tops in a turning-loom. There's fancy! There's simile!LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »